Ranger Station Charlie. We're responsible for keeping the highway up through Novac civilized.

”— Ranger Stepinac

Ranger station Charlie is a location in Fallout: New Vegas. This Ranger station has been charged with maintaining order on the road to Novac. The communications officer at this outpost is Ranger Stepinac.

Contents

Background

The purpose of the station is to keep the road to Novac "civilized". The NCR Rangers, including the one in charge; Ranger Beaumont, are off on patrol and isn’t available.

Layout

Outside the Ranger station you can see many mobile homes and cars piled up as fortifications, implying that the site used to be a pre-War trailer park. You can find some ammunition, weapons and random items by searching through them.

Inside these improvised fortifications, there are stacked camping trailers that have lots of bedding in them. Occasionally, an NCR Ranger will appear in the farthest trailer from the entrance during the night, and will sit in a chair overlooking the road to the left during the day. He is a named character, but has no speech dialogs if the player tries to talk to him. Also, a prospector may be found resting there.

The main building is to the right as you walk through the entrance. If you go to or return to the site at Ranger Andy's request, the station's troops have all been slaughtered. There are two bodies on the floor in the first room, each with an armed frag mine hidden underneath. One of the two audio tapes (tape #2) is straight ahead from the entrance, on top of the three stacked metal boxes. The other tape (tape #1) is under the desk next to the metal boxes. The tape is from the Legion, claiming responsibility for the massacre at Ranger station Charlie, and informing the listener that they took a live NCR Ranger with them.

The room on the left (through the door; the room with multiple bunk beds) contains a trap: a tripwire running across the doorway is connected to a rigged shotgun under the bunk beds, which is pointed at two antique fire extinguishers positioned in front of an armed bottlecap mine that will detonate either with proximity or by the explosion from the fire extinguishers being hit by the rigged shotgun.

The room also contains various junk and two more dead NCR soldiers. The male corpse will have NCR Ranger patrol armor in poor condition, along with a random weapon, usually a pistol or revolver.

Under the bunk bed to the right as you enter this room (the one with the two cinder blocks under it) is a floor safe (locked, average) with ammunition, caps, Rad-X and stimpaks. Under the bed in the northeast corner is a locked footlocker, but it is empty.

Inhabitants

Notable loot

Ranger Station Charlie audio logs - Two audio logs, one under the desk right in front of the player as they enter, and the second on top of the stack of metal boxes, just to the right of that desk. These logs are only present after speaking with Ranger Andy in Novac and agreeing to check on the station.

Related quests

Notes

If you visit prior to receiving Ranger Andy's sidequest, all items must be stolen. However, there are three first aid boxes in the first room that will have disappeared after the Legion attack, so a pre-Andy visit and a loss of Karma is the only way to access them.

Listening to the audio logs, there's a warning from the Legion to the Rangers, also explaining that one of the female rangers, Stella, was taken as a hostage after the raid (she can later be fought as an opponent in the Legion arena at The Fort). Bringing these audio logs back to Ranger Andy will increase your standing with Novac and the NCR, and will give you 200 caps from the "Ranger Veteran Fund", as well as complete that unmarked quest.

Even if the player does not trigger the attack on the station by speaking with Ranger Andy, Legion forces will still occupy the station once Render Unto Caesar becomes active.

Approaching from the hills to east on the way from Novac will result in a Legion Recruit and a few Veterans sneaking over the hills towards the camp. They may attack the rangers but usually do not do anything.

Alternately, prior to the slaughter of the rangers, a four man patrol of NCR troopers may be encountered along the road outside the ranger station. These soldiers may encounter the Legion patrol and engage them.

A little distance away from the station you can find a skeleton with a metal helmet and a crashed motorcycle not the far way from the body.

If you deliver the updated radio codes to the station (part of Return to Sender quest) before talking to Ranger Andy the station will not be attacked and destroyed. Note: The station may remain safe before and after updating the new radio codes during Return to Sender, but once you check on Ranger station Charlie per Ranger Andy's request, you will still find the station wiped out by the Legionaries.

Comm Officer Stepinac is not one of the corpses found after the Legion raid the camp, and will not show up again in the game. This is because Obsidian forgot to move him from the initial cell to the destroyed cell and the initial cell becomes inaccessible to the player once the player receives Andy's request.

Comm Officer Stepinac will mention an excess of medical supplies recently being delivered to the station. The player can ask for some but he will refuse and warn the player not make a habit of crossing the NCR. It is actually possible to obtain some supplies from him, but you need to a have a mixed reputation with the NCR (meaning some positive and some negative).